Gather Darkness

by Fritz Leiber

  If it touched his face he would go mad. He knew it.

  But it did touch his face. Gently at first, recalling the feel of Sharlson Naurya's fingers. "Goodby, Little Brother Chulian."

  Then tighter and tighter, stranglingly, crawling over his mouth. And Brother Chulian wished he would go mad.

  One useless thought insisted on staying in his mind. If he ever escaped, he would never again be able to sleep easily on his little bed in the Sanctuary.

  Abruptly the pressure receded. A door appeared in the wall ahead, letting in wan light. He stared at it stupidly, swaying, feeling as weak as water. Then the realization that escape was possible penetrated his fear-numbed mind. He staggered forward.

  Just outside the door he was bowled over by a scarlet tide of fleeing priests. Cousin Deth was in their midst. From the floor Chulian caught one glimpse of Deth's distorted, sallow face, white showing all around the irises of the eyes.

  Cousin Deth was screaming, "The thing! The thing in the hole!"

  Painfully Chulian half-scrambled, half-crawled after them, out through the chilly, ragged doorway.

  In his ears thundered the uncontrollable, crazy laughter of the crowd.

  Nimbly, the fingers of the Black Man rippled over the banks of close-set controls. His glistening eyes scanned the tenuous solidographic miniature of the haunted house set in front of him. Through the faintly projected walls he watched the tiny scarlet-robed manikins flee from the place, disappearing abruptly as they got outside the visual field of the mechanism. Watched Brother Chulian hobble after.

  His intense concentration took the form of a very gleeful, but rather taut smile. Snub nose and short, bristling, red hair emphasized the impression of impishness.

  He murmured a swift aside to his companion: "I am becoming very fond of that tubby little man. He scares so beautifully." He jerked backward. The little scene had erupted with blinding light.

  "At last they blast the place," he cried. "But Sathanas always laughs last!"

  And lifting a microphone to his lips, he howled manically.

  It was as if a volcano had erupted. The haunted house glowed, flared, writhed, reeked. The four priests on the knoll had finally received orders to get their warblast into action. But its smoky red flare was more suggestive of hell than heaven, and from the crowd beyond came screams of agony, where a momentary puff of its carelessly handled heat had inflicted serious burns. Each narrow street was jammed by fear-crazy, fleeing commoners. Others were seeking to scramble onto the roofs of surrounding houses.

  The haunted house collapsed, ceased to be.

  But from the flaming, heat-blasted ruins rose a shuddering, triumphant laughter.

  The Black Man switched off the master controls and stood up, eying the great keyboard with regret.

  "Too bad its usefulness is over. It was a lot of fun to operate. I shall miss it, Naurya."

  "But it was certainly worth it." She was looking at him seriously.

  "By Sathanas, yes! Commoners laughing at priests—that's a major achievement. Though the poor devils will be sorry they laughed, when the Hierarchy doubles the tithes. But it was a very neat little instrument, just the same, and I have a right to mourn its passing. See, that top bank controlled the walls; the next one below it, floors and ceilings. You mightn't believe me if I told you how many hours of practice I put in before I developed the technique required for such stunts as bouncing that first chap upstairs and out again. Quite a problem in timing.

  "Third bank—windows and doors. Fourth—ventilators, and such furniture as we decided to animate. Including Brother Chulian's overaffectionate couch." He patted a half dozen keys tenderly.

  "Tell me," asked Sharlson Naurya, leaning forward curiously, "did the people of the Golden Age usually have houses that played such tricks?"

  "Asmodeus, no! They were just a fad, I imagine, and a very expensive one. The idea was to have a house whose shape you could change to suit your fancy. Say you had a big crowd in for a party and needed a larger ballroom. You just activated the proper controls and—presto!—the walls would recede. And why not make it an oval or octagonal room while you were at it? Just as easy!"

  He laughed happily.

  "Of course, it all worked in slow motion. But when our investigations showed that the old equipment was still pretty much in order, it was very simple to shove in more power and speed up the tempo, so that the old place could dance a jig if we wanted it to. Then we hitched up our remote controls, and there we were!"

  Sharlson Naurya shook her head. "I can't get over thinking that there's something disgusting about the luxury of a house like that. Imagine summoning a chair across the room because you were too lazy to walk! Or changing the shape of a couch to ease a crick in your back! Sounds too voluptuous." She wrinkled her nose in disgust.

  Looking like some ancient jester, in his black tunic which left arms and legs bare, the Black Man spun around and pointed a mocking finger at her.

  "You've been bitten by the toil-for-its-own-sake morality that the Hierarchy dredged out of the dirty past!" he accused laughingly. "But for that matter, none of us can escape it. I'm glad that in my case it took the form of an urge to play exceedingly laborious and complicated practical jokes."

  Naurya studied him intently, leaning her arm lightly on the edge of the control panel that occupied much of the tiny, bare-walled, windowless room. He lolled back across the padded seat in front of the controls—the only piece of furniture in the room—eying her humorously. She seemed much wiser and more experienced than he, with her coldly purposeful features and enigmatic eyes.

  "Are practical jokes your life's goal?" she asked finally. "I watched you all the time you were operating this thing. As you peered down at those scuttling scarlet little images, you kept smiling as if your sole ambition in life were to play at being a malefic demigod."

  "You've touched my weakness there! But the telesolidograph always gives you that godlike feeling. You must have felt it yourself. Confess!"

  She nodded soberly. "I did. How does it operate? That was the first time I ever saw one."

  "So? I would have thought otherwise, since you are so close to Asmodeus."

  She shook her head. "I know nothing of Asmodeus."

  He looked at her sharply. "He takes a very special interest in you, as if you were one of the most important of us." She did not answer. "But you know the job he's saving for you, Naurya. Do you mean to say that Asmodeus informed you of that job in the same manner that he informed me—by indirect communications?" He watched her for a moment longer, then shrugged his shoulders carelessly. "I can believe you don't know him. I've never met witch or warlock who did, myself included—and in one sense I'm his second in command. Just orders from above, that's all he is to any of us. An invisible fountainhead of instructions. The great mystery." His voice had a jealous tinge. He changed position, snapping his fingers restlessly. "But if Asmodeus gives you the run of our headquarters here and asks me to look out for you, I suppose it's quite proper for me to tell you about the telesolidograph. It's simple, really. The Hierarchy's solidograph is a three-dimensional motion picture. The telesolidograph is the same sort of thing, except that the primary multiple-beam is invisible, long-range, and highly penetrating, only erupting into a visible, three-dimensional image when it reaches the focus. Slightly analogous to a needle-point spray. So, for instance, if we want bare feet scampering around, or what not, we just fake a solidograph of them and feed the tapes into the projector. Phantoms to order! Vocal manifestations work in about the same way.

  "The instrument I used is a bit more complicated, of course. Two-way. Viewer and projector. So I'd have a miniature image of the general focal region to guide me in operating my life-size phantoms and manipulating the remote controls of the house.

  "All our tricks are like that, Naurya. Relatively slight improvements on Hierarchic science. As soon as the priests get on the right track, it'll only be a matter of time before they find the answers. They've started al
ready. Zero-entropy to put the walls in stasis wasn't a bad dodge.

  "That's why, in handling the haunted house, I went light on telesolidograph—one of our real trumps, worth holding up—and heavy on house controls, which we couldn't have hoped to keep a mystery. Only used telesolidograph on the first chap—and on Deth." He smiled reminiscently. "Odd that such a trivial thing should scare our dear deacon. But when Asmodeus sends you a detailed fear-biography of a man, it isn't difficult to put your finger on the weak spot—even of such a cruel crook as the deacon. What's the matter, Naurya? He one of your pet hates?"

  She shook her head, but her eyes stayed as stonily hating.

  "The man behind him," she said softly.

  "Goniface? Why? I know, of course, that the special job for which you're being saved involves Goniface. Something personal about it? Maybe revenge?"

  She did not answer. He stood up.

  "A little while ago you asked me about my aims. What are yours, Sharlson Naurya? Why are you a witch, Persephone?"

  She took no notice of the questions. A few moments, and her expression changed.

  "I wonder what is happening to Armon Jarles."

  He looked at her quickly. "Does he figure in your aims? You were hurt when he balked last night. Are you in love with him?"

  "Perhaps. At least, he has a deeper motivation than the urge to play practical jokes. There's something firm-rooted about him, solid as a rock!"

  The Black Man chuckled. "Too solid. Though I was sorry we lost him. Sathanas, but we need men! Men of ability. And it's just those that the Hierarchy grabs."

  "I wonder what is happening to him," she persisted.

  "Unpleasant things, I fear."

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  Chapter 6

  Armon Jarles crouched where the shadows were darkest, trying to force himself to make a plan. But the deep wrath-ray burn on his shoulder had already started a fever, so that the throbbing dance music and squealing laughter from the house behind him became an evil thing, weaving nightmarish visions in his pain-racked mind.

  This was the only part of Megatheopolis where curfew violations were tolerated. This district sacred to the ministrations of the Fallen Sisters. This place of slinking forms, priests without halos, cracks of light, doors that swiftly opened and closed, whistles, whisperings, throaty greetings, and invisible merriment with overtones of a desperate melancholy. A wanly beautiful, flimsily clad girl, standing in a lighted doorway, had seen him pass. There must have been something hunted about his manner, for her eyes had gone wide with terror and she had screamed, once again bringing pursuit down upon him.

  For a moment they were off on a false scent, beating up another street. But they would be back. They would be back.

  He must think of a plan.

  Fever dulled hunger, but his throat was dry. Ill-made sandals cut his swollen feet. He had not realized how two years in the Sanctuary had softened him.

  But other pains were nothing to the rasping of the coarse, stolen tunic against his unbandaged shoulder.

  He must make a plan.

  He had thought of leaving Megatheopolis. But neatly cultivated fields offered poor concealment, and if the farmers proved themselves half as hostile to him as the commoners of Megatheopolis had—

  He must—

  But an agonized swell in the sultry music conjured up an evil vision of his mother's work-worn face. Even now it was hard for him to realize that she had betrayed him. That his father and brother had done the same. Home. The one place where he had been sure he could find refuge. Even their obviously cold, unfriendly, panicky reaction to his sudden appearance had not put him on guard. But sidewise glances—and that matter of sending his brother off on an unexplained errand—had finally forced him to recognize the truth. Almost too late. He had barely outsped the deacons his brother had brought. That was when he had got the wrath-ray burn. It was then, too, that he had learned there was a price on his head, a price which every commoner lusted to earn.

  He had had to grapple with his father and knock him down, when the old man had tried to hold him.

  His mother's shadowy face, like something seen through heat waves, seemed to leer at him in the darkness. He reached out his hand to brush it away.

  Perhaps, he told himself, feeling all the while that the universe was crazily tipping, he ought to be glad they had acted as they did. It showed that deep in their beings the commoners nursed for the Hierarchy a hate almost beyond belief. A priest backed by the Hierarchy was something to fear, to fawn upon, almost to worship. But a priest whom the Hierarchy cast out—their one chance to give expression to their hatred! It was commoners who were pursuing him now. Commoners led by deacons. But commoners.

  Two years ago he had passed his examinations and set out, his head crammed with determinations to improve the morality and living conditions of the commoners and to do his part in hastening the New Golden Age. He had thought of himself as helping his family.

  But on that same day his family had looked upon him as someone lost to them forever, as having become something more and less than a man—a priest—inhuman.

  "Look! There he is!"

  He shrank, blinking, from the searchbeam. Pain lashed through his stiff muscles as he lunged into a run and darted up the alley across the street. A wrath ray sizzled against the far wall.

  Cobbles. Bite of the sandal thongs. Rasp of the tunic. His hurt arm dangling. Darkness. Rectangle of light. A woman's painted face. Screams.

  Running. Running. Running.

  Sudden swell in the shouts behind him, as they reached the mouth of the alley. Violet needle of a wrath ray over his head.

  But before it chopped down into him, he had swerved into the next street, crossed it, and plunged into the ruined area toward which he unconsciously had been heading.

  Rubble. Matted weeds. Feeling his way. Great blocks of stone and fractured plastic. Ragged wall that might have been erected before the Golden Age. Narrow, twisting spaces. Blind alleys. A maze built by the dilapidation of mighty structures.

  Shouts from behind. Circle of light just above his head, against a vast, jagged block. Ducking. Wriggling. Crawling.

  More shouts, very close. Panicky rush for cover. Flood of pain, like blinding light, as his burnt shoulder rammed rock. Biting his cheek to hold back the scream. Salt taste of blood.

  From that point onward he had no object but to burrow deeper and deeper into the ruins. Always to take the darkest and narrowest turning available. Sometimes the shouts moved away. Sometimes they drew close. That in the course of his aimless progress he would eventually crawl into the hands of his pursuers, was a fact depending on a kind of reasoning that no longer held significance for him.

  It seemed to him he could still hear the dance music, throbbing in rhythm with his shoulder, screeching obscenely, wailing raucous despair. And the whole universe was dizzily swaying to the tune. He wanted to dance, too, but it hurt too much. He was someone else. He was Armon Jarles, but Armon Jarles was someone else. His father—his father was an archpriest. Those grim old arms were hugging him and would not let him go. His brother was a chubby, cooing little baby, named Brother Chulian. His mother—

  A beautiful girl stood in a doorway, smiling at him, beckoning. Closer and closer he edged, his suspicions melting. Then she reached suddenly forward, and caught his hurt shoulder, and wrenched it, and from behind her poured a tide of scarlet robes. And her features grew old and work-worn, and his mother, dressed in a tawdry tunic, leered at him.

  But her features were getting too old, much too old even for his mother. Cheeks were sinking, lips puckering, nose growing to a thin beak, chin becoming a brown knob.

  "Wake up, Brother Jarles!" A cracked whisper.

  Something was wrong with the face. It was real, and he did not want to look at reality now. But the hand kept hurting him. He tried to push it away, looked up, saw, in the glow of a searchbeam striking above the narrow passageway, the same crone-face, recognized it.

/>   "Come with me, Brother Jarles! Come with Mother Jujy!"

  Almost, he smiled.

  "I'd sooner you had the reward than my father," he murmured.

  A bony palm was clapped over his mouth.

  "You'll bring them down on us! Get up, Brother Jarles! It's not far, but we must hurry, hurry!"

  It was less painful to get up than to lie there and be tugged at. After a little while he managed it, though the effort made the darkness reel dizzily and brought back the visions. As he staggered along beside her, leaning on the skinny shoulder, it seemed to him that she kept changing. First his mother. Then Sharlson Naurya. Then Mother Jujy. Then the girl in the doorway. Then his mother—

  "Let me call them," he said, smirking foolishly. "No need to look for them. Just let me call them and they'll come. Then—just think—you'll have the reward all to yourself. Or are you afraid they'll cheat you out of it?"

  For answer, he was rapped across the mouth with a cane.

  "There he goes! There he goes! Someone with him!"

  Sudden turn into a side passageway. Eager voices baying from all directions. Another sharp turn. Then he saw Mother Jujy tugging at the weeds, tilting up a whole section of them.

  "In! In!"

  The blow had given him a little sense. He let himself down into the black hole she had uncovered. He half-climbed, half-slipped down a short ladder, rolled away from the bottom of it, lay there.

  The shouting was cut off. Pitch darkness. Silence.

  After a while a light was struck, and he saw the ancient face grinning toothlessly at him over a candle flame.

  "So you see how Mother Jujy claims her reward, Brother Jarles!" she cackled.

  She hobbled over to him and poked at his shoulder, lifting the cloth. He gritted his teeth.

  "I must fix that," she mumbled. "Fever, too. But we must go aways first. Drink this."

  She put a little bottle to his lips. The fiery liquid made him gag and gasp.

  "Burns, doesn't it?" she observed gleefully. "Not like the wines of the Hierarchy, is it? Mother Jujy makes her own nectar. Mother Jujy has a still."